Executive Vacuities

[dgs49]

Hmmm.

No, I don't think so.

I would much rather work for a company that actually is lean and efficient, and hopefully one that exploits me shamelessly to enhance its own profit. Ironically, I have in several cases worked myself out of a job by implementing standards and procedures that could be followed by any competent administrator, thus making myself an expensive luxury. That's life.

I am at this minute on my Boss's shit list because I applied for another position internally; he says he can't afford to lose me. It is fucking perverse.

[Gob]

Surgeons want to protect their job title to prevent foot, cosmetic and, presumably, tree surgeons from using the word. Are people increasingly sensitive about job titles?

It's a familiar film trope in the historical epic - the wounded and screaming soldier held down by an orderly. "The whole leg's going to have to come off," says a man in a once-white shirt that has been long-since soiled by the viscera of war. His sleeves are rolled up and he brandishes a bow-saw. A grimy bottle of Kentucky Salt River Bourbon is handed to the patient. The surgeon begins his work.

With a profession so steeped in blood and saws, one can understand the Royal College of Surgeons' need to protect the word surgeon. There are certain jobs where the title is hard won and deserves to be preserved.

The issue at the moment is whether only people who have a medical degree should be able to call themselves surgeons. It's a question that is threatening to make an incision in the surgeon community. On the one hand, podiatrists - who don't necessarily have a medical qualification - argue they have spent 12 years training in order to bill the foot.

Meanwhile, the British Association of Aesthetic Plastic Surgeons aka Baaps (please stop sniggering down the back - seriously, what age are you?) agree with the RCS.

Titles are a sensitive topic for surgeons as it is - back in 2005, Hugh Philips, the then president of the RCS, said it was time that surgeons stopped being Mr/Miss/Mrs and became Dr.

I'm not so sure. If your profession is already specialised and skilled, the mister seems to project an air of understated authority and cool. No-one could argue that Laurence Tireaud - aka Mr T - would have any more authority if he was Dr T. And if anyone does think that, well… I pity the fool.

Job titles are important. For centuries, humans have attached a lot of their identity, self-worth and, some time ago, their surnames to their trade. An obsession with titles could indicate a certain insecurity in some people about what they do - especially when it comes to heads of state, who may not do a whole lot.

Idi Amin famously went by the title His Excellency President for Life, Field Marshal Al Hadji Doctor Idi Amin, VC, DSO, MC, CBE, Lord of all the Beasts of the Earth and Fishes of the Sea, and Conqueror of the British Empire in Africa in General and Uganda in Particular.

But it's worth noting that even he realised there was a limit to the respect one can garner for being Lord of the Fish, and he went and found a local university to make him a doctor (of law of course). It's likely Idi Amin collected these odd titles to reinforce his image as one of a buffoon, thus distracting the world from the killing of his own people.

Idi Amin may have been joking but he was eclipsed in all seriousness by the job title of Wilhelm II, Emperor of Germany whose full moniker ran to 158 words, in order to make sure it counted all the territories within his power, including Duke of the Wends and the Kashubians - Western Slavic tribes who are two of the most wonderfully titled peoples there have been. The Kashubians will no doubt have their name appropriated for use in an epic novel set in a fantasy world, and the Wends (especially their American descendants, the Texas Wends) are destined to be The-Next-Band-After-Mumford-And-Sons.

For Kaiser Willhelm-esque job-entitling nowadays, you need look no further than the work-orientated social networking website LinkedIn.

The more is less principle seems to apply. If you search for the profile of the head of your company, it may simply say CEO. That is a job title that needs no further elaboration. Move further down into the bowels of a large organisation and you will see titles like knowledge champion, value driver lead and dynamic paradigm orchestrator start to appear.

The first two are real, while the last one is not. It's generated by a simple algorithm on a website that creates imaginary job titles and sometimes, accidentally, these turn out to be real. However, just because a job has a whiff of bovine ordure about it, it doesn't mean it's a meaningless endeavour. A lot of people with impenetrable titles are actually movers (location change management specialists) and shakers (arthymic oscillating technicians).

Occupations seem to evolve now faster than the language, and so many new ones are composed of combinations of vague words rather than the matter of fact you-hit-this-with-this descriptive nouns of old. Millions of positions require no tools other than a brain, some software and kit to run the software on. Since no-one wants to be called a computer tapper or meeting-room-herd, a title needs to be found.

Now I'm thinking that maybe comedian and writer doesn't really do me justice. I see myself more as a humour enablement consultant.

It puts less pressure on me. I don't have to make you laugh, just create the conditions to allow you to achieve your laughing potential.

When compared to surgeon though, it just doesn't cut it.

[Gob]

Readers sent in a rich response to last week's Magazine piece about inflated job titles.

Here, they share some of their most important-sounding, obscure and sometimes downright bizarre titles, past and present.

1. My job title is director of life enrichment. It sounds:

ambiguous
overwhelming
unbelievable and also
impressive

Quite a responsibility - endeavouring to enrich the lives of an unknown population of an undisclosed number. And it's never an option when you have to pick from a list of occupations in the survey. I am not a social worker, a local government worker, a social-care provider or a teacher, although all of those could be considered with the job title. In reality I am responsible for planning, organising and implementing a programme of therapeutic activities and events for senior adults ranging in age from 73-101 and with a huge variety of interests, skills, abilities and functioning levels.
Amy Laughlin, South Carolina, US

2. Back in the 80s the father of a college friend rejoiced in the title general manager, eastern hemisphere for a major multinational.
Alison Wheeler, London, UK

3. I work at a law firm and one morning the receptionist had stepped away from her desk. Placed on the ledge was a sign that read "The director of first impressions has stepped away and shall return shortly." At first I thought, "who?" and then realised the sign referred to the receptionist.
Justine Kaye, New York, US

4. I was impressed when a friend told me her husband was an environmental maintenance officer. I could have sworn I'd seen him emptying the bins on our street.
Mrs C, Paris, France

5. I think the shortest job titles are the best.

HM Elizabeth II, Queen
Bill Gates, Chair, Microsoft

All the other stuff is just fluff. Wannabes.
Sarah, Toronto, Canada

6. I once saw an ad in the paper for a job entitled anti-social behaviour co-ordinator, working for the police. A very important and worthwhile job aiding the community I'm sure, but it does make you sound a bit like someone who actually organises the anti-social behaviour rather than someone who works to reduce it.
Paul, Bristol, UK

7. Medical doctors actually have no right to use the title "doctor", as in ancient Greek it means "learned teacher".
TB, Los Angeles, US

8. I'm a freelance graphic designer and for the last few months have been working on an e-commerce website in the unenviable role of back-end manager. Until the company involved comes up with a more high-falutin title, I intend to keep quiet about it.
Adam Linley, Bury UK

9 and 10. One friend was appointed director of operational excellence. But the biscuit was taken by an ex-colleague recently, whose new job title is technical evangelist. That's certainly one way to describe him. S
am, Reading, UK

11. Job title inflation is nothing new. When I started work in a large company 30+ years ago, before PCs, they had a printed internal phone book. Some clerk in accounts or sales had the job title section leader - rest of the world.
Richard Taylor, N Lincs, UK

12. A previous boss at a cafe used to refer to me as the underwater ceramic technician (aka dishwasher).
Amy, UK

13. I used to be a media publications administrator... when I was 10. I was a paper-boy.
Jason Laird, Brentford, UK

14. My favourite inflated job title is probably using the word reprographics for photocopier. I first heard it at school and have found it mildly amusing ever since.
Richard, Woking, UK

15. A local business that deals with stopped-up toilets and does sewer line cleanings is cleverly named the drain surgeon.
Ray Krueger Koplin, Colorado, US

16. A few years ago I saw a job advertised for a sandwich technician. On reading further I discovered the employer was none other than Subway. I didn't realise making sandwiches was so technical.
Andrea Highfield, Stoke-on-Trent, UK

17. My window cleaner is now called a transparent-wall maintenance engineer.
Paul Pearson, Shrewsbury, UK

18. A few years back I was working in an office. And there was a lady there who had the job title refreshments and nutritions supervisor. She of course, worked in the office canteen and served us our chips every day.
Chris, Cheshire, UK

19. I was once called a textile masseur in the Royal Navy. I scrubbed decks.
Johnny Grundy, Hong Kong

20. My brother used to work as a butcher's boy in a local well-known supermarket. He preferred to go by the title of meat distribution engineer.
Martin Hoggle, London, UK

21. Whilst scouring the jobs section in my local paper in Canterbury, I saw an ad for eviction technicians. It took a second or two to realise the nightclub needed some bouncers.
Matt, UK

22. My company no longer has cleaners, it has washroom operatives. And of course on my commute I no longer have to endure ticket collectors, as they are now revenue protection officers.
Paul, London, UK

23. I used to work for a company called Ninja Theory making video games; my official job title, printed on my business cards was lead code ninja. It made applying for mortgages or insurance interesting. Handing my card over I would get some strange looks and was once asked, "So... What category would that come under in the drop-down list on the computer? Military?"
John Lusty, Surrey

24. While working in Saudi Arabia I was visiting the Emir of Sabya - a village in the southern part of Saudi Arabia. There I met a person (from Pakistan). We shook hands and he said that his job title was chicken engineer. It took a lot of effort on my side not to laugh. It turned out that the Emir of Sabya owned a chicken farm, and that person was responsible for the farm.
Handojo Sutjahjo, The Netherlands

25. It's not just now that we have long and difficult job titles. In Staffordshire the saggar maker's bottom knocker was a skilled job needed to ensure pottery was fired correctly. J
ames Sherwood, Biddulph, Staffordshire

[rubato]

In our Shanghai group EVERYONE is a "manager"! In the US it does not confirm the same level of status which the chinois find too irresistable and thus no one gives a shit.



yrs,
rubato

[loCAtek]

Padding an eval back in the ninties, I called the guy who mowed the lawn a: Landscape Maintence Engineer.